Tuesday 17 November 2015

Rhino Dehorning at Rietvlei Nature Reserve with Animal Tales

Sadly Rhino poaching in South Africa is a major problem with 749 deaths this year alone. In 2014 the figures hit 1,215, that's one Rhino killed every 8 hours and the numbers have been rising year on year. According to the South African Department of Environmental affairs, Rhino deaths will out number births in 2016-2018 leading to their extinction in only a matter of a few years.
This has led to many nature reserves, including Rietvlei dehorning the Rhinos to protect them from poachers. It has been 3 years since the last Rhino was poached at Rietleiv due to additional security measures. The Rhino's horns will grow back over time in the same way fingernails do.
I've paid a couple of visits to Rietvlei on my recent stay in South Africa, they currently have 16 rhinos and I was fortunate to see 4 of them.

I hope when I next visit South Africa, I get to see many more, but sadly, I don't think this will be the case.
































10 comments:

  1. It's so sad how animals are being hunted down and killed as what? A sport? For money? In this day and age, when everyone supposedly knows that it's wrong and even illegal to do so. I hope that we don't lose anymore of these beautiful creatures! #animaltales

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    1. it's for the rhino horn which has absolutely no medicinal properties what so ever

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  2. I feel so sad that the Rhinos have to be de-horned to spare them from being poached. It's a greedy world we live in. :(

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    1. it is very sad, but it saves the rhinos life

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  3. they are very beautiful animals. It is shocking the depths to which people will descend.

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    1. it's truly awful how they slaughter the poor animals

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  4. It makes me so angry ! Love the rhinos

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  5. So many rhinos killed and for what - their horns? Long may this programme live and long live rhinos. Thank you for adding this post to #AnimalTales and for being such a good supporter of the link over the last year.

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    1. killed for matted hair that has no properties what so ever, at least the horn grows back, but i worry about all the darting they have to do to de horn the rhino

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